Military / Law / Literature
Orlando B. Willcox
1823–1907 · Union general, lawyer, author
Detroit-born West Pointer and Detroit lawyer who led the 1st Michigan Infantry to Bull Run, won the Medal of Honor and served as a Union general.
- Born
Detroit, Michigan Territory- Died
Cobourg, Ontario, Canada
aged 84- Birth name
- Orlando Bolivar Willcox
- Also known as
- Orlando Bolivar Willcox
- Detroit years
- 1823–1843, 1857–1861, 1865–1866
- Field
- Military, Law, Literature
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Orlando Willcox was born in Detroit in 1823 and entered West Point in 1843, graduating in 1847 into the artillery. He served in the Mexican–American War, on the frontier and in the Third Seminole War before resigning in 1857 and returning home to practice law in Detroit, where he also wrote novels under a pen name. When the Civil War began he was appointed colonel of the 1st Michigan Volunteer Infantry, the first western regiment to reach Washington in 1861. At the First Battle of Bull Run he was wounded and captured while leading a brigade; held for more than a year, he was later awarded the Medal of Honor for his conduct there. Exchanged in 1862, he became a brigadier general and commanded divisions and a corps at Antietam, Fredericksburg, in the Knoxville campaign and at Petersburg. After a brief return to Detroit law practice he rejoined the Regular Army, commanded in Arizona, where the town of Willcox is named for him, and retired in 1887.
Highlights
- Colonel of the 1st Michigan Volunteer Infantry (1861)
- Medal of Honor for gallantry at First Bull Run
- Union brigadier general and brevet major general
- Practiced law in Detroit before and after the war
- Willcox, Arizona, is named after him